WSU School of Music faculty members Karen and Jeff Savage, also known as 88 Squared, discussed their work with prominent contemporary composer Lowell Liebermann on the National Public Radio program New Music from Bowling Green.
The now-married piano duo met while they were students at the Juilliard School, which is where they also met Liebermann. In 2015, 88 Squared recorded all of the composer’s works for two pianos, including a sonata that they commissioned.
“One of our missions as a duo is to expand the relatively limited body of works for two pianos,” Karen Savage said. “To be able to ask a composer of his stature to write something new—which is actually being performed by other duos to our great pleasure—was exciting.”
The duo’s recently released recording includes the new sonata and Liebermann’s “Variations on a Theme by Mozart for Two Pianos,” a piece inspired by an aria in Mozart’s opera Abduction from the Seraglio. “Liebermann is very creative in the way that he changes the theme while retaining the humorous characteristics of it,” Karen Savage said.